Author

Award Date

Degree Type

Degree Name

Department

Computer Science

First Committee Member

Evangelos A. Yfantis

Second Committee Member

John T. Minor

Third Committee Member

Jan B. Pedersen

Fourth Committee Member

Robert F. Boehm

Number of Pages

109

Abstract

The electric energy generated by solar panels declines due to dust particulates, bird deposits, water spots, and other contaminants that inhibit sunlight absorption and promote light scattering. As part of our research, we use cameras to capture images of solar panels, and analyze the images to detect the amount of scattered light. The more scattered light there is, the less light there is to penetrate the solar panel glass and reach the part of the panel that converts incident light to electric energy; therefore, less energy is generated. In this paper, we discuss the classification algorithm we developed to classify panels as clean or dirty. Dirty panels suffer from loss of electric energy generation and they need cleaning in order to restore their performance.

Keywords

Disciplines

Computer Sciences | Oil, Gas, and Energy | Theory and Algorithms

Language

English

Repository Citation

Ho, Suzanna, "Spectral Decomposition of the Scattered Light due to Deposits on the Solar Panel Surface, and Cross Correlated to Power Loss" (2014). UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones. 2270.
https://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu/thesesdissertations/2270